Pages

Sunday, July 27, 2014

Leopard beats Tiger and tops CAT List

IIT-Bombay continues to be the top choice for the best of the young brains with animal spirits in the country. The institute has retained its position as the most sought-after IIT in the country, with Delhi and Chennai coming a distant second and third.

A number of factors have been responsible for this, ranging from importance given to streams, valleys, green foliage, canal over geography, from placement records to newer short-term courses on offer, tell students.

Students at IIT-Bombay's Powai campus were excited after a leopard was spotted at a research workshop at the institute to conduct his internship. An institute staffer, who went to open the workshop for the day, sighted the leopard around workshop area. What followed was a day of chaos and confusion, as forest officials waited for signs of the animal's movement in and around the building.

So IIT Mumbai started “Who will bell the CAT”, also announced reservation for Big Cats.

IIT-Bombay students on evening used a robot fixed with a camera called Iron Drone to locate the leopard that was spotted in the metallurgical engineering and material science workshop in Powai a day earlier, but forest officials who searched the footage on a laptop were unable to detect any sign of the big cat, but found lot of unrelated material.

A trap, with a bait of four chicks in the lab had been laid, has been unable to attract the animal, who seems to be interested in a thirst for knowledge in this day.

"Many strategies are being planned by the forest officials to trap the animal. The remote-controlled Google-car sent in, did not help. But since the leopard is a nocturnal animal, it gets active at night. He was located once on Wednesday night."

"Animals do not understand business affairs and therefore they settle down wherever they feel that they can get a good place to hide. Probably that's why it went into the lab. The workshop is a less-frequented area and is used by research fellows and not young minded students. Research activities at the workshop will be stalled for a few days, till forest officials confirm that the area is safe".

Forest officials said "leopards generally hunt once in seven days, depending on how hungry they are, considering it is time-consuming and stressful. Tranquilizing the animal seems to be difficult for the forest officials as the exact location of the animal is not known."

However, student spotted the cat late at nightclub during after hours. Chitesh Vaagh, a local rescuer, said as leopards are shy creatures, they don't come out during the day and they are party animals.

Despite keeping forest department officials on their toes for three consecutive days, the big cat smartly managed to escape from the research workshop of IIT-Bombay. On Saturday, after a search, the forest officials handed over the workshop to the IIT.

Forest officials said it was good that the animal had escaped unharmed because had he remained trapped, he would have required to be in captivity for 4-5 days for a medical and Human Resources Examination, after which he would have been released and only on confirmation from HR executive that it has “No Dues” would it be released in the Sanjay Gandhi National Park. Such procedures are known to stress the animals a bit.

The advisory further stated that Students should not move around unaccompanied at night as lonely and dark stretched of roads should be avoided in the evening, as they can cause depression.

''When dogs bark, howl or run frantically at night every 6 months, it may be taken as warning of the leopard's presence nearby. However Leopards are afraid of light and crackers bursting. Hence, it is advisable to carry a torch and flick it around like Eveready batteries Ad while moving at night within the campus area'' stated the mail from the Inn-security officer.

Meanwhile, In forest Leopard is reunited with his family...Happily Forever.....